202 PROCEEDINGS: BOSTON SOCIETY NATURAL HISTORY. 
basidion principally in their smaller size and in the greater tendency 
of the sporophores to branch and proliferate. The mycelia also 
produce abundant chlamydospores. 
(/) Lentodium squamnlosum, which bears helicoid conidia upon 
long attenuated hairs arising from the young veil and from the margin 
of the developing pileus. The principal interest attaching to this 
species, however, lies in the structure and method of development 
of the basidiosporic fructification. The stipe and pileus are those 
of an agaric, but the hymenial region is occupied by a thick layer of 
irregular tubes and chambers whose external openings are more or 
less completely closed by a white flocculent veil. Diffusely spreading 
hyphae arising from the trama form this veil and by diverting the 
direction of growth of the young plates of the hymenium cause 
the porose-cellular development of the hymenial layer. The writer 
inclines to the belief that Lentodium is an autonomous species, whose 
systematic position is between the Agaricaceae and the Polyporaceae. 
(g) In addition to the bulbils of Corticium alutaceum two other 
species of bulbils were found in the field which produced scattered 
basidia in pure cultures. Hence the formation of bulbils may be 
looked for in other species of Hymenomycetes. 
(5) The quantity of data bearing upon the polymorphism of 
Hymenomycetes is still too limited to make generalizations of much 
value, but from the facts at hand it appears: (a) that a considerable 
majority of Hymenomycetes possess no secondary spores; (6) that 
oidia are common among the Agaricaceae and Polyporaceae, and are 
confined to those two families; (c) that chlamydospores occasionally 
occur in connection with the basidio-fructification, as in Nyctalis, 
Ptychogaster, and Fistulina, and are quite widely distributed on the 
mycelia of all families; (d) that conidia and other highly specialized 
secondary methods of reproduction are rare, and occur more frequently 
in the Thelephoraceae than in the higher families. 
Dartmouth College, 
Hanover, N. H. 
